DERC Founder and Director, Dr. Colin Rhinesmith submitted a notice of ex parte filing to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today as part of the FCC’s Digital Discrimination proceeding, which is described in the following March 2022 news release:
“The Notice of Inquiry starts the process of establishing a shared understanding of the harms experienced by historically excluded and marginalized communities, with the intent of making meaningful policy reforms and systems improvements.
The Notice asks for comment on how to implement provisions in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that require the FCC to combat digital discrimination, and to promote equal access to broadband across the country, regardless of income level, ethnicity, race, religion, or national origin.”
To help inform the FCC’s proceeding, which asks for input on several questions including this one, “What data the Commission should rely on as it considers the issue of digital discrimination?” Dr. Rhinesmith submitted this letter with an overview of findings from our extended case study of the Digital Equity Leadership Lab (DELL) program, which was created by amalia deloney, Vice President and Director of Digital Equity at the Robert W. Deutsch Foundation and one of our DERC Advisory Board members.
Here’s a snippet from the letter, which references our extended case study report:
“In the following section, titled ‘Digital Injustice in Charm City’ we argue, to understand the digital divide in Baltimore one must begin by acknowledging the history of colonization, land theft, slavery, systemic racism, and white supremacy that has shaped the United States, and more directly the digital injustices that exist in Baltimore. The HOLC’s map above offers one strategy to investigate how a history of discriminatory federal housing policy has impacted access to resources, participation in policymaking, common ownership of public resources, and healthy communities for Black, Indigenous, and people of color. (p. 112)
Because our work at the DERC seeks to move beyond deficit-based perspectives, we highlight the DELL program as a digital justice response. Our findings suggest that community leaders working to promote digital equity can benefit from seeing their work within a ‘digital equity ecosystems’ framework, which calls attention to the importance the interactions that exist among individuals, populations, communities, and their broader sociotechnical environments that all shape the work to promote more equitable access to technology and social and racial justice. The paper concludes with recommendations for community leaders and other key digital equity stakeholders working to uncover systemic discrimination shaping digital inequality today and to advance digital equity and justice.”
To download a full copy of the filing, please visit this link.
